‘Sometimes you’ve got to chuckle’: a quintet of UK instructors on dealing with ‘six-seven’ in the classroom

Throughout the UK, school pupils have been exclaiming the expression ““67” during lessons in the latest internet-inspired craze to take over schools.

Whereas some instructors have opted to calmly disregard the phenomenon, others have accepted it. Five educators explain how they’re managing.

‘My initial assumption was that I’d uttered something offensive’

During September, I had been speaking with my secondary school tutor group about preparing for their secondary school examinations in June. I can’t remember precisely what it was in connection with, but I said a phrase resembling “ … if you’re targeting results six, seven …” and the whole class erupted in laughter. It took me completely by surprise.

My immediate assumption was that I had created an allusion to something rude, or that they detected something in my pronunciation that appeared amusing. A bit frustrated – but honestly intrigued and mindful that they had no intention of being malicious – I asked them to clarify. Frankly speaking, the explanation they offered didn’t provide greater understanding – I remained with minimal understanding.

What might have caused it to be particularly humorous was the considering motion I had performed during speaking. I have since found out that this typically pairs with “six-seven”: My purpose was it to aid in demonstrating the action of me thinking aloud.

With the aim of end the trend I try to mention it as much as I can. No approach reduces a craze like this more emphatically than an adult attempting to participate.

‘Feeding the trend creates a blaze’

Understanding it aids so that you can steer clear of just accidentally making remarks like “indeed, there were 6, 7 thousand people without work in Germany in 1933”. In cases where the digit pairing is unavoidable, having a strong school behaviour policy and expectations on student conduct really helps, as you can deal with it as you would any different disruption, but I’ve not really needed to implement that. Rules are one thing, but if pupils embrace what the educational institution is practicing, they’ll be less distracted by the viral phenomena (especially in class periods).

Concerning 67, I haven’t wasted any instructional minutes, aside from an infrequent raised eyebrow and stating ““indeed, those are numerals, excellent”. If you give oxygen to it, it transforms into a wildfire. I treat it in the equivalent fashion I would treat any different disruption.

Earlier occurred the mathematical meme craze a while back, and there will no doubt be another craze subsequently. That’s children’s behavior. During my own youth, it was doing television personalities impressions (admittedly outside the school environment).

Children are unpredictable, and In my opinion it’s the educator’s responsibility to behave in a manner that redirects them back to the path that will get them to their educational goals, which, hopefully, is graduating with certificates rather than a conduct report extensive for the employment of random numbers.

‘They want to feel a part of a group’

Young learners employ it like a bonding chant in the playground: a pupil shouts it and the other children answer to show they are the same group. It resembles a call-and-response or a stadium slogan – an shared vocabulary they share. I believe it has any particular meaning to them; they simply understand it’s a thing to say. No matter what the current trend is, they desire to experience belonging to it.

It’s prohibited in my teaching space, however – it’s a warning if they exclaim it – identical to any additional calling out is. It’s especially difficult in maths lessons. But my students at fifth grade are children aged nine to ten, so they’re quite adherent to the rules, although I recognize that at high school it might be a separate situation.

I have served as a teacher for 15 years, and these phenomena last for a month or so. This trend will diminish soon – they always do, notably once their younger siblings start saying it and it’s no longer trendy. Afterward they shall be engaged with the following phenomenon.

‘Sometimes joining the laughter is necessary’

I started noticing it in August, while educating in English language at a language institute. It was primarily male students saying it. I instructed teenagers and it was widespread among the less experienced learners. I had no idea its significance at the time, but as a young adult and I understood it was merely a viral phenomenon similar to when I was at school.

Such phenomena are constantly changing. ““Skibidi” was a familiar phenomenon during the period when I was at my teacher preparation program, but it didn’t particularly exist as much in the learning environment. In contrast to “six-seven”, “skibidi toilet” was not scribbled on the chalkboard in instruction, so students were less able to embrace it.

I just ignore it, or sometimes I will chuckle alongside them if I accidentally say it, trying to understand them and understand that it is just youth culture. I believe they just want to experience that feeling of togetherness and camaraderie.

‘Lighthearted usage has diminished its occurrence’

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